THE LONG, WILD RIDE TO IOWA: How Donald Trump set the presidential campaign on fire

In November — the sixth month of the Donald Trump phenomenon — he
seemed to talk himself into the possibility.

"I'm going to win, I think," he told Business Insider in an
interview then.

A little more than two months later — in the eighth month of his
campaign — he is in prime position to do just that.

Beginning with an uproarious campaign launch in June,
Trump has set the 2016 presidential campaign on fire, as he looks
to do what most political observers once considered unthinkable:
Win the Republican presidential nomination.

After more than a year of campaign bluster and posturing,
Iowans will cast the first votes in the presidential-primary
process on Monday. They will be followed by the voters of New
Hampshire on February 9. South Carolina and Nevada come next.

The Republican side of the presidential race has been defined by
the provocative, brash billionaire, who was such an afterthought
a year ago that he did not register in most primary polls. He has
defied years of political conventional wisdom on the way to
dominating leads in those first four voting states.

Along the way, his campaign has been defined by a handful of
signature moments that have proved controversial — but have only
served to bolster his campaign.

'Some of them, I assume, are good people'

The announcement arrived in the inboxes of reporters on June 11,
2015.

"DONALD J. TRUMP MAJOR ANNOUNCEMENT," it blared.

Trump had flirted with presidential runs almost every cycle for
the past two-plus decades. It didn't seem like a sure thing until
June 16, the date of that major announcement.

He descended the escalator inside Manhattan's Trump Tower.
Several minutes into a rambling speech, he finally said the
words.

"So, ladies and gentlemen, I am officially running for president
of the United States, and we are going to make our country great
again," he said, those last five words becoming the rallying cry
of his campaign.

Something he said later in his speech, though, would become a
source of controversy for weeks afterward.

"When Mexico sends its people, they're not sending their best;
they're not sending you," Trump
said. "They're sending people that have lots of problems, and
they're bringing those problems with us. They're bringing drugs.
They're bringing crime. They're rapists. And some, I assume, are
good people."

One June 16, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R) was on top of
national Republican primary polls. Trump languished in the bottom
half of the outsize field, registering 3.6% support in a
RealClearPolitics average of recent surveys. One month later —
July 19 — Trump was at 16.8%, leading the pack. He has not looked
back since.

Between and thereafter, throughout the campaign, he has made
illegal immigration a focal point. He pledges to deport the
approximately 11 million people who immigrated to the US
illegally, build a wall along border between the US and Mexico
(and make Mexico pay for it), and make companies hire unemployed
US workers before immigrants.

"Right now you have millions of people that are on line for years
trying to come into this country. Millions of people. I don't
know if you know this, but millions and millions of people are
going through a process to come in legally. These people came in
illegally. They're called illegal immigrants," Trump told
Business Insider in November.

A January CNN poll asked Republican voters nationally which
candidate they most trust to handle the issue of illegal
immigration. Fifty-five percent said Trump.

Republican
presidential candidate Donald Trump works a rope line after a
town hall on January 29, 2016, in Nashua, New
Hampshire.Getty
Images

'Turning point'

On July 19, Trump took the lead in the polls. It was not expected
to last for long.

"He's not a war hero," Trump Trump said of Sen. John McCain (R-Arizona)
then. "He's a war hero because he was captured. I like people
that weren't captured."

It was the "turning point" of the Trump campaign, said The New York Times' Nate Cohn. In what
became a recurring feature of the news cycle, prominent
Republican figures and his presidential rivals lashed out at
Trump.

Instead, it only served to prove early on Trump's Teflon-like
nature — and to illustrate how much the Republican base had
soured on McCain, its 2008 nominee. The real-estate developer
continued to soar upward heading toward the first Republican
presidential debate.

Two weeks later came another one of those moments that, for most
other candidates, would likely have served as a turning point.
Trump had, during the August 6 debate, clashed with Fox News
moderator Megyn Kelly, who had confronted him about his past
derogatory statements about women's looks.

He was not pleased by the line of questioning. The night after,
he went on CNN and made a comment that many interpreted as a
crude reference to menstruation. Trump later claimed his critics
were misinterpreting his remarks.

"You could see there was blood coming out of her eyes. Blood
coming out of her — wherever," Trump said of Kelly's debate
performance.

The deluge soon followed. Rivals blasted his comments. The
influential Red State gathering of conservatives responded by
demanding Trump apologize and then by rescinding his invitation from its
gathering that weekend.

But Trump did not back down, choosing instead to engage in a feud
with Fox News. Days later, the conflict thawed as Trump and Fox
News chief Roger Ailes spoke by phone.

"I assured him that we will continue to cover this campaign with
fairness & balance. We had a blunt but cordial conversation
and the air has been cleared," Ailes said in a statement then.

Trump continued to fly upward thereafter. He faced challenges
from retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson, who briefly overtook him in
a handful of national polls, and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), who
soared to eventually provide a strong contest to Trump in Iowa.

But by December 6, Trump was the top choice of more than 30% of
Republican primary voters nationally. It was more than a 14-point
lead on his next-closest competitor.

'Dog-whistle talk'

The Republican presidential front-runner was proposing to ban
immigration and tourism to the US for Muslims.

"Until we are able to determine and understand this problem and
the dangerous threat it poses, our country cannot be the victims
of horrendous attacks by people that believe only in Jihad, and
have no sense of reason or respect for human life," he said, his
statement coming on the heels of the December 2 terror attack in
San Bernardino, California, and the November attacks in Paris.

The proposal caused a distinct and pronounced backlash. By now,
some rivals — like Bush, the once front-runner who had dropped
more than 25 points behind Trump — were willing to make clear
breaks with the mogul.

"Look, the guy's not serious. He's not a serious person," Bush
said in a December interview with Business Insider. "He
can't be commander-in-chief. He doesn't have plans. This is all
dog-whistle talk. This is to provoke anger. This is to — with all
due respect to the media — this is to generate massive attention
to him. It's not about a serious plan. Is that a serious plan in
all reality? Of course not."

But Trump forged ahead. Polls showed that a majority of
Republican primary voters agreed with his proposal. By the end of the
year, according to RealClearPolitics, he was up to 35.6% in the
polls.

'I am so glad I made this ridiculous trip'

The statement landed in inboxes on January 26.

"Trump Campaign Statement on FOX News Debate," its subject read.

Trump, the Republican front-runner, announced a boycott of a
debate in Iowa, four days before the Iowa caucuses, on a network
that has a reputation for being the most Republican-friendly
cable network.

"Unlike the very stupid, highly incompetent people running our
country into the ground, Mr. Trump knows when to walk away,"
Trump said.

In the days since he announced the high-profile boycott, the conversation has pervaded around whether
he made the right decision or one that could cost him precious
votes in Iowa on Monday.

Trump, for his part, didn't think so when he took a
pseudo-victory lap in New Hampshire on Friday, declaring that
Cruz got "pummeled" and that he was "glad" he wasn't there.

Tired and lacking sleep, he talked about his "ridiculous"
overnight trip from Iowa to Nashua, New Hampshire. But he sounded
like he was also reflecting on a long journey that looks like
it'll only go on for much longer.

"I love you," he told his supporters. "I am so glad I made this
ridiculous trip."